Toni
Contributor
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2011
- Messages
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- Basic Beliefs
- Peace on Earth, goodwill towards all
Your premise seems to be countered by the National Institute of Justice:Only if you dismiss the 2020 political violence that has largely been coming from the left.Keyword: Historically. These days it's from the right.
And this year somebody detonated a bomb at the Alabama Attorney General's office. While nobody has been caught yet, chances are the motivation was from the left wing.
What NIJ Research Tells Us About Domestic Terrorism
Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism.
nij.ojp.gov
What NIJ Research Tells Us About Domestic Terrorism
NIJ-funded research projects have led to a better understanding of the processes that result in violent action, factors that increase the risk of radicalizing to violence, and how best to prevent and respond to violent extremism.
Date Published
January 4, 2024
By
Steven Chermak
Matthew DeMichele
Jeff Gruenewald
Michael Jensen
Raven Lewis
Basia E. Lopez
Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism. Since 1990, far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists, including 227 events that took more than 520 lives.[1] In this same period, far-left extremists committed 42 ideologically motivated attacks that took 78 lives.[2] A recent threat assessment by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security concluded that domestic violent extremists are an acute threat and highlighted a probability that COVID-19 pandemic-related stressors, long-standing ideological grievances related to immigration, and narratives surrounding electoral fraud will continue to serve as a justification for violent actions.[3]
However others see many similarities between left wing and right wing violence:
A comparison of political violence by left-wing, right-wing, and Islamist extremists in the United States and the world
Following the 9/11 attacks, there were large increases in Islamist terrorism driven especially by al-Qaeda, ISIS, and their affiliates. More recently, we have seen an upsurge in right-wing political extremism in countries around the world. Despite the ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
More generally, there is growing evidence suggesting that extremists representing different ideologies may have more in common than has been assumed (20). For example, extreme liberals and conservatives both represent the social world in a similar, simplistic way, which distinguishes both groups from more moderate individuals (21). In studies of behavior in conflict, one study (22) found that both right-wing and left-wing extremists used more negative and angrier language than moderates did. Finally, a strong inclination to defend one’s beliefs against worldview-violating groups and a low tolerance for such groups has been identified for both liberals and conservatives (23). Taken together, this research suggests that left-wing and right-wing extremists could be equally likely to use violence to pursue their ideological goals.